1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates generally to improvements in microwave ovens and more particularly to improvements in mounting the microwave oven control panel.
2. Brief Description of the Prior Art
Microwave ovens, indeed all ovens, have heretofore been constructed with a separate area mounted on the oven housing especially dedicated for the mounting thereon of the microwave oven controls. This separate area has been commonly known as a control panel. A good example of the state of the prior art can be seen by reference to U.S. Pat. to Ronald G. Buck, No. 4,162,381, assigned to the assignee of the present invention.
This location was dictated because the components to be controlled were located inside the main oven housing. The only other conceivable location of the control panel, the door, was not an obvious location primarily because of two factors: first, there was the difficulty of communicating signals from the controls mounted on the rotably mounted door to the components mounted in the fixed oven housing; and second, there was the difficulty in communicating these signals across the space between the door and the oven housing which, in a microwave oven, was subject to high electromagnetic interference (noise) from leakage from the cavity, magnetron and other high power electrical devices mounted with the oven housing.